Equestria Daily as an Information Community

According to Fisher & Durrance’s Information Communities, the need for people to connect with one another around certain focal points or subjects is an important one and draws those in need to particular resources (often on regular and continuous basis).

With this said, I have decided to make Equestria Daily my information community of choice. This website and on-line community relates to everything involving My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic, the fourth incarnation of the Hasbro franchise aimed at young girls. The first three generations of it had the gender stereotypes and similar issues that tended to characterize shows for this age group and audience. But one driving force behind MLP: FIM was to dispose of such stereotypes while developing a strong show with good storytelling and complex characters.

Those facts, coupled with its appearance during all the recent advances and emphases on technology, have caused an explosion of fan-related communities and creations—which allow people of a wide age range to interact and connect.

Equestria Daily is one of the largest of these information communities, and I will go through each of Fisher & Durrance’s characteristics of information communities to show why:

 

1. Exploits the information sharing qualities of technology

Equestria Daily functions as a website and virtual environment for any visitors. The homepage has a stream of postings, each labeled according to the topic they cover. However, the site also makes good use of other social media platforms like Twitter or Facebook to allow community members different ways to access or contribute information.

2. Collaboration among diverse groups

On Equestria Daily, children and adults participate in the community by contributing fan creations, arranging meet-ups at conventions related to MLP, and comment on each other’s work in constructive and genial manner. These submissions clearly come from people who handle similar content in new ways (such as relationships between different characters, possible story lines, and story concepts based on an MLP framework) but also hail from a variety of lifestyles and locations.  

 

3. Formation around user needs

The homepage for Equestria Daily contained all the postings that have ever been placed there. However, there are also nicely labeled sections so visitors can see materials related to specific interests, such as fan art, comics (fan and official), music, etc. All the pages contain a side bar containing the hottest or biggest topics currently available on the site, and even a countdown clock to events like the release of comic issues or site events.

 

4. Helps to overcome trust barriers

I am more of a lurker at this point on the Equestria Daily site, checking it on occasion to see what new things are afoot (or “ahoof”, as the information community there might say). But the great thing about Equestria Daily is the level of privacy afforded to visitors and even contributors. Those who comment on any postings can do so anonymously, only volunteering more personal information when they choose. Even most contributors to the site remain largely unknown, except for the works they produce, or their actions within the fan community as a whole.

 

5. Fosters social connectedness

One wonderful thing about Equestria Daily is the friendly community atmosphere it fosters. The MLP fans who contribute and comment on different resources available are a kind and understanding group. This is because the show they follow emphases this same compassion and diversity, which is why many of them came to the series in the first place. Also, due to how pertinent the strong storytelling, characters, and animation are for fans, Equestria Daily tends to focus on encouraging these creative aspects of the fan base. So various artists can discuss their works and get stronger, mingle with other fans, and form friendships.

 

There are other reasons, but those are things I will explore in my research paper later on. :D